Flashback Friday: Graduation Day!

Happy Friday!! In case you missed my Twitter yesterday, I've decided to transition Throwback Thursday officially to Flashback Friday! I'm not sure if I'll keep the linky or not; I think you all like reading and seeing some of my old stuff, but no one really is doing it, too:) So we'll see!

Now, something historic happened 11 years ago yesterday. Something so monumental it has stayed with me forever! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, on May 24, 2001, I graduated high school!!! Ahhhhh!!!

Wow, now let us take a moment to take a deep breath in realization of just how long ago that was. And how old I really am....

Actually, let's not dwell on that! hahaha.

Graduation was a huge deal! Everything we knew was going to be over and the future was full of complete unknowns. Sure, most of us knew where we were going to college and maybe had an idea of what we'd major in, but what would we do after? Who would we marry? Would we have kids? Where would we live? It was a vast unknown, and it was scary.

And exciting.

And sad.

This song actually came out for the class of 2000, but it was still played on the radio graduation season of '01 and to this day, when I hear it, it holds special memories to me! Do you all remember this song??:)

*sigh* good ol' days.

My high school graduation was pretty wonderful. I was valedictorian (okay, go ahead and talk about what a dork I was lol) and had a really fabulous speech! (I'm going to share the parts of it that I remember sometime because it's honestly relevant for even today!) It was the last big event that my Grampa was able to attend before he passed away in 2004. After the reception, high school boyfriend and I went to McDonalds and I'm pretty sure the McDonalds worker thought we had just gotten married! (I was in a white dress and he in a suit and tie lol).

So... eleven years later... and look how far I've come... finished college... have a real job... no husband or kids yet (and I'm okay with that!:) but at times... I still feel like I'm that seventeen year old girl. I have a lot of the same insecurities and fears. The same thoughts and feelings. I've definitely matured, but I think there's a part of me that will honestly always be that seventeen year old girl...

How about you? Do you remember your graduation?? How long ago was it?? (if it's within like 5 years, don't tell me, I'll just feel older jk;) What special memories do you have from high school? How has your life changed?

Share your thoughts with me in the comments!!:)

Flashback Friday: Butterfly Clips

Hi Lovelies! So Throwback Thursday is Flashback Friday again this week lol. For those of you who haven't seen one of my posts like this, here's how it works: I post some pix and talk about some fabulous or silly or horrid makeup or fashion trend I took part in back in the day. I encourage other bloggers to share some pictures and/or stories too and link up in the link below so that we can all reminisce (or laugh or cry) about some of the things we used to do! There's no real rules. If you want to follow me, follow me (there are several options to your right --->); if you don't want to (why not??? lol) then don't. Just put your link to your Flashback Friday post in the linky and check out some others!

via

So this week! Who remembers butterfly clips?? OMG these were all the rage for a while. They were basically just mini hair clips made of plastic and shaped like butterflies. A lot of times they were really cheap (and cheaply made! lol) so that if you squeezed too hard opening them, they'd just crack. Or if you put too much hair in them to hold, they'd break! And they wouldn't just kind of break... like the spring would pop out, the metal piece would fall down. It was a mess.

And how would one wear these? You could put one on each side of your head to hold back bangs or sides of your hair, you could put just one on one side. OR! (and I soooo wish I had a picture of this!) You'd twist little sections of your hair back and have 4-6 clips the whole way over your head--almost like a headband--like that same section of your head. That's how I usually wore mine (didn't everyone??) which is why it's so unbelievable (and sad!) I couldn't find any pix of me like that!

But I do have a couple pictures to show you when I used a butterfly clip on each side of my head. The nice thing about them was they never had to match. Like, the more varieties of colors you had, the better it looked!

Ta-da! So there's your fun walk down my memory lane today! Did you use butterfly clips? Do you remember how many you had? Did you have some other clips that were similar? (like what were those banana clip things?? Probably more from the 80s than the 90s...) Share your link below!:)

Flashback Friday: Vintage is from when??

Hellllooo darling friends and HAPPY FRIDAY!!!! You may have noticed there was no Throwback Thursday post yesterday (sorry!) Life just got in the way and I wasn't able to get it up in time. HOWEVER! Today, I have a special treat for you! Flashback Friday! Like Throwback Thursday, but different! (and no, I'm not planning on this being a regular thing, just today or days where I have something flashback'y to share;)

So, let's discuss "vintage"! When someone says the word "vintage" what do you think of? In my head, "vintage" to me still means *old* stuff--like probably from the 60's and earlier? Like if I'm poking through an antique store, it would be full of antiques and very "vintage" stuff!

Well, let me share an article with you that I saw earlier this week that just baffled my mind on what is now *technically* considered "vintage"!

The 90s Are Now Officially "Vintage" According to the People Who Deem Things Vintage

by Danica Lo, Glamour Magazine

Today in things that may or may not make you feel old: according to the people who officially deem things "vintage"—turns out, "vintage" isn't just synonymous with "really old"—clothes and accessories from the 1990s can now officially be deemed vintage.

My favorite 90s show: My So Called Life

A few months ago, we told you about how LA's Decades co-founder Cameron Silver was on the hunt for vintage 90s items, and today, Catwalk Queen reports that Patricia Dillon, the Divisional Leader of Design and Applied Arts at the University of Wolverhampton, has decreed: 

For something to be classed as Vintage it needs to be of sufficient quality of design and creative execution for it to stand the test of time and be relevant and desirable to future discerning generations. The 90s are now officially classified as Vintage because we are two decades on and a new generation is starting to discover and enjoy the creative fruits of musicians, designers, artists and film makers who delivered their ideas 20 years ago.

What does this mean? Well, things that were popular in the 90s—like grunge, big shoes, neon, babydoll dresses, neo-preppy, and Euro-designer monograms (everywhere, on everything)—are back in a big way. What do you think about that?

(via here)

Can you believe it?? The 90's still don't seem *that* far away to me. Many of my favorite memories happen in the late 90's, and it just makes me feel sooooo super old to think that the stuff I wore, knew, and loved are all now considered vintage...

Were you surprised at this fact? What is your favorite thing about the 90's? Or what is something you miss most from that decade?

Throwback Thursday: Should've Been Over It...

It's time for another edition of Throwback Thursday! YAY!! [insert applause here]. Last week there wasn't a huge turnout of sharing, but I will continue doing this ('til I run out of things to share lol) and invite you to share your past trends in the linky at the bottom of the post!

So this week, I'm sharing a trend that I'm sure at least some of you were also a part of back in the 90's. I promise this was actually popular at one time! OVERALLS! Not just for farmers;) LOL. Overalls hit the market in the early to mid 90s and were seen in both grunge and hip hop arenas of fashion.

Did I have overalls? Ha. Ha. Oh did I!

I had overalls. I had an overall jean jumper. I had the short overalls (actually 3 or 4 of those. With flowers embroidered on the pockets). I also had non-denim overalls! I had corduroy overalls in khaki, brown, and black. Hahah, that's actually kind of embarrassing to admit. But yes. I loved overalls.

It might even be able to be called an... obsession?

I'm not even sure WHY I loved them so much!! I was just convinced they looked good all the time with everything:) Here are a few examples to show just how much I was obsessed with my good ol' denim overalls.

Here I am in 1998......

   .....and 1999....

   ...and 2000...

And it's not even like I can say those are *different* pairs of overalls. And it's not like I didn't have other (cuter) jeans to wear...

I actually LIKED these. Okay, there's my confession. lol.

Hi, my name is Kristen and I was addicted to overalls....

However! I can safely say I have not worn overalls in the last decade:)

Your turn! What crazy, fun, silly, or just plain sad fashion or makeup trend did you find yourself caught in back in the day?? :)

Throwback Thursday: Trendsetter Baby Barettes

Hey lovelies! So it's week two in my Throwback Thursday series! Yay! And this is the first week I'm inviting all of you to join it! It's super duper simple. All you have to do is add your link to your Throwback Thursday post (not just your blog, the actual post so we can see yours!) and voila! Done. Sure, you can go ahead and follow my blog (GFC, HelloCotton, Bloglovin, whatever) or my Twitter or my Facebook, blah blah blah. But I don't care; if you want to participate, by all means DO SO!:) (*note, it's for Thursday, but I'll run it from 6pm on Wednesday nights to 6pm Fridays:)

I'm very excited about sharing a picture with you today! But first a few things, back when I was younger (and you can tell by the picture--skinnier lol) I had this insane thought that I could somehow start trends. Like, I was convinced that if I used something for a long enough period and could make it look "cool" others would start doing it. THEN it would be a nationwide or worldwide event! And I'd be like, Oh, yes, that was *me* that started that.

Hahaha, I'm not really sure I can claim any one thing actually did come from me, but...

What I'm sharing with you today is something I was convinced would actually catch on.

Baby Barrettes! Now first off, what girl didn't have like a million of these plastic things when she was a little girl? Maybe it was 'cause my mom was just lazy at doing my hair, lol, but almost every picture of me from age 6 and below, I had these in my hair!

When I was... oh about... Nineteen or so, I decided that baby barrettes needed a comeback! Lots of girls were using bobby pins or whatever to pin their hair back, but why not DO IT WITH STYLE??

The summer of 2003, nearly every day, I wore baby barrettes in my hair. Oh and I had ALL of them. Bows, bunnies, teddy bears, THE DAYS OF THE WEEK ONES! Omg, those were my favorite.

And just when you thought it couldn't get any better! This was also the year I was OBSESSED with the zigzag part. I would spend sooo much time with my rat-tail comb in the bathroom trying to get it just right... the section goes right.. that section goes left, a little over top... this section right again...

It was like a science. That I would occasionally master.

Now, I do believe that Walmart and Target both saw gross increase in baby barrette sales that year* and I'm pretty sure it was because of me:)

Maybe I should try this trend again? Things come back every 10 years or so right? ;)

Your turn! Show me some of the fun, crazy, or just plain sad fashion and beauty things you tried back in the day!!:)

* ~ I totally made this up; there is NO statistical data to support this fact. But it's what I like to tell myself;) hahahahahha

Throwback Thursday: Puppy Face

Hey Lovelies! Ohhhh I sooo wanted to get this post done sooner today, but for those of you who don't know I got reallllly sick this week. I swear, I hardly EVER GET SICK *EV*ER*. But when I do, it is bad. I went to the doctor yesterday, and I have not one but two infectious diseases. Fabulous. I'm on antibiotics now and my fever has broken, but I'm fighting a sinus infection AND bronchitis. Blech. I'm snotty and coughing and gross. But on the road to recovery!

Now that we're all done feeling sorry for me, lol, I want to share with you my new, super fun, exciting idea!!! (yes, being on these drugs has suddenly made me more creative lol)

Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you to the first ever installment of THROWBACK THURSDAY!!!

Insert applause here;)

You may not be as excited as I am right now because you don't know what it is! So let me explain it to you!:)

Growing up we all made some interesting beauty and fashion choices, and I want to go back and relive some of those! So starting today, I'm going to share a picture or some story about some fashion/beauty trend I was sooo into at a prior point in my life. Some of them will be fun (and funny); some will just be sad. Hahahha.

Here's why it's exciting FOR YOU! Next week, I'm going to set up a little linky widget and welcome you all to write your OWN "Throwback Thursday" post and share it with everyone else! So kind of like a mini-mid-week blog hop:) We can all walk down memory lane together; and hopefully share a few laughs (or tears, as the case may be hahahah)

So for today's first Throwback Thursday, I wanted to show you one of the first times I attempted makeup...

Okay, maybe not real makeup... Maybe a Crayola marker...

The point is, even at age 5, I had an eye for creativity and was interested in playing with designs on my face! I believe this was a "puppy dog" look that I was going for ;)

What makes it even better is that I have a T-shirt on over my bathing suit. Had I been outside? Was I going outside? Or was this just an interesting fashion choice to go along with the fabulous face? hehehe. The world may never know! I do love how I took special care to make sure my eyebrows were colored too... hahahah crazy girl...

So this first week's throwback was kinda silly, but stay tuned for some other fun ones:)